The present invention relates generally to an improved electrophotographic sensitive member, and it relates more particularly to an improved electrophotographic sensitive member of the type including a coating of a photoconductive material on a flexible web substrate with attaching means at one end thereof for mounting the electrophotographic sensitive member to electrophotographic equipment, such as an endless support.
Conventionally, the photosensitive member plates employed in image transfer electrophotographic reproducing apparatus have been those formed with a layer such as Selenium, Selenium-tellurium alloy or Selenium-arsenic alloy directly over the surface of a metallic drum or endless belt by vacuum deposition, or those formed with a coating inorganic semi-conductive corpuscles of such as CdS, CdSe and ZnS-CdS over the surface of said drum or belt by the use of an organic resin binder, such as alkyd resin, epoxy resin, acryl resin or the like.
However, with these photosensitive member plates, it generally is necessary to deposit or to coat the photosensitive material onto the rotary drum or the endless belt individually and thus not only is the productivity awkward, poor and expensive, but the restoration and repair of damages caused to the photosensitive member are time consuming and difficult.
In overcoming these disadvantages of the conventional photosensitive plates and for improving the productivity thereof, the photosensitive member, formed with an electrical photosensitive layer over a durable and flexible sheet-like film composed of polyester film or the like or metal sheet, mounted over the peripheral surface of a drum or an endless belt has heretofore been provided. For this type of photosensitive member, a member coated with a charge transportable complex composition, for example, polyvinylcarbazole containing TNF (trinitrofluorenone) on a polyester film metalized with aluminum, or a member including such film vacuum deposited with a thin layer (less than 1 micron) of inorganic semiconductive corpuscles of Selenium or Selenium-tellurium alloy and coated thereover with polyvinylcarbazole not containing any sensitizer, or a member in which the polyester film is coated with ZnO or CdS over by the use of the aforesaid organic resin binder, or a member coated with CdS over a transparent polyester film with the use of said organic resin binder and further coated thereover with graphite carbon or the like acting as an electroconductive layer with the use of said organic resin binder are known in the art.
Various methods and means for mounting and attaching the aforesaid type of photosensitive members on a rotary drum are described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,341,681, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,552,957 and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,588,242. In the aforesaid patents there are described systems in which metal clamp portions provided at both ends of the photosensitive member are spot welded or riveted to a rotary drum, or in which there is provided an opening running parallel to the axial direction of the rotary drum and there is disposed a pair of winding means inside said drum, and the photosensitive member extends from said winding means over the peripheral surface of said drum.
However, with such methods for attaching the photosensitive member provided with or without attaching means, special tools or devices such as a welding or a riveting tool are required to attach the photosensitive member over a drum, and the structure rotary drum itself is highly complicated as it requires a longitudinal opening and sufficient interior space for the housing of the winding means thereby resulting in numerous drawbacks and disadvantages, including high costs and poor application efficiencies.